Another interesting bit of information about emotional reactions; it happens because it’s our egos way of protecting itself from death.

Yep, our ego fears its own death most.

Passional emotional reactions can usually end up linked to this, along with beliefs, values and occasionally a persons self proclaimed identity.

Don’t get me wrong, we need such things.

Without emotion we’d be no better than machines.

That being said, they can get in the way and control people for many years, a lifetime in some cases.

We link emotion to everything we do, literally

Once you can understand how and more importantly why then you will have a very powerful set of skills to help not only yourself but countless others as well.

Let us take food for example.

You will have a specific food that links to a specific emotion/feeling and when you’re not getting said emotion/feeling you will dive straight into the cupboard/fridge/freezer to pull out your crutch for that hit of instant gratification & feeling.

We subconsciously know this as well.

Why else do you think we ask people if they feel better after they’ve eaten?

We don’t ask them – “Are you nutritionally sustained from your meal?”.

No, we ask them how they feel and it they feel that they need any more or anything else.

Listening to the way people talk is an incredible skill.

Allowing each word to settle in your mind while also observing all the idiosyncrasies can really help you understand a person.

First though you must understand yourself.

“Because, if you can’t love yourself how in the hell you gonna love somebody else?Can I get an Amen?” – RuPaul

Give some though to the above, are you in control of your emotions or re they in control of you?

You may hear many people talk about how you learn from every mistake, and so on.

I can tell you from experience that you don’t.

That is certainly not the case here on this side of the screen your reading 😂

It’s like the grey matter between the ears recognises what has just transpired was a colossal mistake and vows never to make it again.

Then it immediately hits the ‘reset’ memory button.

Shortly followed by this thought:

‘That seems like a good idea, yet why do I have this strange forbidding feeling in my stomach…. Meh, it’s probably just something I ate.’

*Cue fool errand and obvious impending mistake.

There is a reason we make the same mistake repeatedly.

It’s because of familiarity.

Yep, being the clever species we are, and one that tends to like sequential things, symmetry and especially patterns (ones we recognise from past experience), we’re likely to make the same mistake countless times.

It’s easy to get drawn in by what we know, even subconsciously.

We see, feel, connect with something that seems like we already know and that’s all we need.

This happens throughout life.

As such fitness is no exception to this, just look at the diet industry, that monstrosity has been spamming out the same new fads for decades and people still get drawn in.

These days I could tell you exactly what will happen if I ramp up the amount I’m doing.

Week 1 – Feels good

Week 2 – Feels better

Week 3 – Death Reheated

The drop off rate is alarming, and that isn’t at a high intensity either.

Ironically if I was to play with loads at 80%+ with 5-25reps daily I can sustain that for months and make progress.

GTG style also works very well.

^^ This would be on one or two movements per day.

A session may look like this:

A1 – Press x6x2-4

A2 – Carry x60 seconds

A3 – Pull x6x2-4

^^ 1-2min rest between each movement

Creep that up by a standard volume increase, say

Week 1 6×2-4

Week 2 7×2-4

Week 3 8×2-4

Then these days bad things would happen.

Funny how sometimes that which we truly enjoy doing just isn’t good for us.

That being said I’f I was to have a high volume session I’d have to look at training every 3-5days.

By high volume I mean like I used to train only a mere 5-6 years ago.

Trade offs, trade offs, trade offs.

It is a struggle to let go of something you became so accustomed to.

I’d be that guy who was a true work horse.

If something wasn’t progressing then I’d simply do more work, there was endless energy and nothing slowed me down.

*Life looks over – “Aha, do I have a surprise for you.”

We only have so much that we can give.

So why is it why always try and give more than that which we have?

We could be here all day discussing that.

Our attitude of – “I just need to do a little more’

It’s a foolish one, seriously, the only person ho cares how hard you work in the gym is you, all the people looking on in awe will forget you the second someone else catches their eye doing more than you.

If you view of yourself is similar to mine form thee days of old, please heed my words.

Don’t break yourself.

It’s just not worth it in the long run.

Unless you are a paid athlete, like a legitimate one, not an Instagram one, they don’t count.

Working yourself in to the ground isn’t worth it.

For us average folk we can make leaps and bounds training every 3-5 days with higher volume/intensity styles of training.

Now there are many ways to train, I’ve shared plenty.

Some of which I’ms are you’ve seen and thought – I like that, I will try it, for 3 weeks, then got bored as results didn’t come as fast as you felt you deserved and thus you reverted back to your comfort zone of what you always did.

“Foolishness Dante, foolishness.”

In fact I’m going to extend a withered hand.

All you need do is ask and I’d happily write you something to do of the next 6months for free.

Why?

Why not.

It would be something you’d question because it’d be very different from what you’re doing (I’m willing to bet).

The question is this though, would you be willing to give it an honest go for 6 months or would your addiction to more get the better of you?

Will you take the sacrifice to one or perhaps several steps backwards to make a giant leap forwards?

It’s a scary thing to think about.

A sacrifice isn’t a sacrifice until it hurts you.

Giving up a little of what you’ve worked so hard to achieve thus far seems easy in principle.

Especially when there is the allure or greater rewards.

In practice though, it tears you apart.

For body builders it is getting chunky in a bulk, casting off their awe inspiring stage body which garnered so much attention, respect & admiration is easy to say an plan, just incredibly hard to do.

An athlete at the top of their current game, living the high live and getting all the rewards have such things hit them rather hard as well.

This is because being at the top of your class invariably means you’re at the bottom of the next one above you.

Winning regional and even international evens pales in comparison to winning the worlds, or etching your name in the records books.

To achieve that a sacrifice of pride would be required.

It would come in the form of “They just can’t quite hold their own at this new level.” and other such retorts.

This is pain, this is sacrifice.

No one likes being at the bottom once they’ve achieved notoriety, no one.

Yet if you want to really move forwards it’s what you need to do, no if’s, but’s or maybe’s, this is a certainty, that is unless you’re content with staying in the same place.

All of this applies to us regular folk as well.

You may have lost some weight, gotten in shape & more.

As such you achieve all the good things that go with it, for a time anyway.

At some point this is no longer your peak, it’s your norm and to hold on to the respect and admiration you need to be will to sacrifice it and take a hit or several so that you can move forwards.

This is where people struggle.

Many get paralysed by the fear of being seen as less than they now are.

Taking their foot of the gas if you will.

I get understand it you know.

How it feels to be caught between that metaphorical rock & hard place.

We get very attached to our attachments.

Our current living legacy if you will.

So we hold ourselves back for the fear of what pain we will have to endure to make it to the next level with no guarantee it will happen or not.

That my friends is the kicker.

We may put in all the effort, all the heart we can muster and endure every gut wrenching sacrifice to no avail.

Left a broken heap thinking – “What was the point of any of this?”

I wish I could tell you there was a 100% guarantee your hard work and effort would be rewarded, however I can’t.

That is it risk you take for the reward you seek.

I suppose the big question is this, do you want to be remembered and more importantly, what you do you want to be remembered for?

Say you’re a guy who can squat 3xBW, that’s great, however a lot of people can do that.

Perhaps you’re a lady who can do 10 strict pull ups, big whoop, plenty of others like you can do exactly the same.

Yet if you top say a 5xBW lift or 70 strict unbroken pull ups, well now you’re something special.

Any achievement that is done for any of the above.

That being the feelings, respect, etc from others will demand more and more of yourself to be given to the mob for your no longer doing it for you, you’re doing it for them.

This is the price you pay for selling your soul as it were.

You’ll get all the comforts so long as you keep all the eyes watching you happy, the second you don’t though, you’re dead to them.

Harsh as it sounds we humans are fickle creatures.

When you hear of people say they are doing what they do for them you should always question it because if it’s true you’ll be able to tell as they won’t try to convince you to change your mind because your opinion, while they will respect it, doesn’t matter to them.

If people try to win you over then their goals are not for themselves.

So my good people who’ve stayed reading this far, which one are you?

Will you take the sacrifice to one or perhaps several steps backwards to make a giant leap forwards?

Are you obsessed with the first while also being caught in the vicious cycle of the second?

Many are because loosening the reigns it too scary.

Did you know that on average people eat between only 15-20 different foods per week.

It’s not a great amount of variety, yet I know why many do it.

Safety, familiarity and all that other good stuff synonymous with the comfort zone.

From a calorie tracking perspective this makes things easy, yet it also means there might not be much change physically.

When you eat the same foods again and again the body will become better accustomed to processing them, in another word more efficient.

This will potentially lower the TEF a tad.

You’d also be surprised as o how devoid of certain nutrients you may actually be, a common consequence of lacking variety of foods.

Now many might say it’s because they don’t like certain foods, which might be true, however more often than not they’re just being fussy because their parents allowed them to be that way in their youth.

There is also the potential case that they’re being lazy.

We are not talking about preparing 5 star gourmet every day, however a little change will do you the world of good.

Sticking with the same foods all the time,while not only dull, will also lead to anxiety when you can’t get your fix because you feel your control slipping away from you.

I’ve seen it happen time and again.

Being the intelligent individuals you are, I’m sure you can understand that without change there will often be no change.

This applies to your nutrition as well.

Opting for more variety in what you eat can help you start to make that much sought after progress you desire, honestly.

You can keep the calories at whatever level they need to be for your desired goal while changing the food choices.

^^ On a calorie laden note, you can have higher days and lower days so long as the total amount of calories across the longer term tracking (say 1 year) is in sync with your goal – surplus for gain, deficit for loss.

^^ You don’t need to eat the same calories day in day you, you wouldn’t do it for training volume/intensity so remember you don’t have to do it for food either.

Do me a favour, keep a food diary for 2 weeks.

Sit down and take a look at those two weeks and see how many foods you eat on average, I’m willing to bet it falls in to the above (15-20).

*Of course i am bias towards a more whole foods approach to nutrition from a health stand point, however if on any given day you want cake then have the damn cake, enjoy it, don’t lament it, then adjust your foods the next day and carry on with life.

Once you’ve done this take a look at all the other foods you can add in, swap/substitute and enjoy.

Most ironic of all is all the people that call themselves ‘foodies’ are of the aforementioned ilk.